Rats and lizards — that’s what is being served to students in the world’s largest school meal programme. And to make matters worse, in one of the cases, the meal was supplied by International Society for Krishna Consciousness (Iskcon).
The spotlight on mid-day meals in the wake of the
Saran tragedy, is revealing a picture that grows nauseous by the day.

“On Monday, the sambar supplied from Iskcon kitchens for Mangalore’s Katipalla government high school contained a dead rat,” said block education officer C Lokesh, who has already issued a notice to the organisation. No one from Iskcon was available for comment.

The saving grace was that the discovery was made before the food was served to students.

But students in an upper primary school in Rajasthan’s Bhilwara were not so lucky. A dead lizard was found in the dal on Tuesday and soon after, 78 children landed in hospital with food poisoning.